Research proposed here examines two major problems in speech perception and proposes replication of some studies of communication of speech through the skin. The first major issue is the study of vowel perception. It has long been argued that perception of vowels depends on the listener adjusting to the vocal tract of the speaker on the basis of some sample of on-going speech. Our research indicates that vowels are perceived with high accuracy; that context from a given speaker results in little improvement in accuracy and that "steady-state vowels" are poorly perceived in most circumstances. Studies of speaker differences, $ consonantal context, on-going speech versus citation form, etc., are proposed. The aim is to find dynamic cues in syllables that can be used for direct perception of vowels or to find cues used in adjusting to speaker characteristics. The second major problem has to do with the categorical perception of speech sounds. It is argued that speech is "special" and that its processing involves special characteristics. A variety of explorations of such characteristics are proposed, ranging from studies of categorical perception in adults to identification and discrimination in children who make speech sounds only poorly. The role of experience will be carefully appraised. Past research suggests that some aspects of speech may be communicated through the skin via an artificial external cochlea. We intend to repeat such experiments with several versions of such a device. BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES: Edman, T. R., Strange, W., & Jenkins, J. J. Acoustic vs phonological factors in vowel identification. JASA, 1976, 59, s 25, (A). Strange, W., Jenkins, J.J., & Edman, T. Identification of vowels in CV and VC syllables. JASA, 1975, 58, s 59 (A).